


The Red Thread

by Debesmanna



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fairy Tale Style, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Johnlock Fluff, M/M, Mrs. Hudson Ships It, POV Sherlock Holmes, Red Pants, Red String of Fate, Romance, Soulmates, repairing trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-10
Updated: 2013-07-10
Packaged: 2017-12-28 14:03:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/992818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Debesmanna/pseuds/Debesmanna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sherlock nearly places the book aside, uninterested in children's tales and already growing bored, but a detail makes him pause. There is a crack in the spine, and when he lets the book fall open in his hands, it's clear that a child has pushed the pages of one story flat more times than any other, leaving broken binding and dingy marks on the edge of the page. John's bookmark makes a red slash across the print. When John was Johnny, a chubby and wide-eyed child far removed from the man that he would become, he returned to this story more than any other. And even now, he has returned to it again, adding an unnecessary marker to a page that he is in no danger of losing.</p>
<p>Tucking the bookmark behind the front cover, Sherlock begins to read."</p>
<p>Sherlock doesn't believe in gods, but perhaps he and John have managed to tie their own red thread of fate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Red Thread

**Author's Note:**

  * For [NinjaFro](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=NinjaFro).



> This one is for my friend NinjaFro, who requested Johnlock fluff and red pants. I did my best, so hopefully I didn't disappoint! ^_^

The first detail he notices is  _warm_. The skin is the body's largest organ, and so little used by the rest of humanity except for pads of hands and fingers dragged clumsily across objects. It's true that other stimuli filter in unconsciously—pressure on the bottoms of the feet from walking, the press of temperature and humidity, the warning ripple of gooseflesh—but sensations must be conscious before they are data. So  _warm_ becomes the first detail when he opens the door, closely followed by the more general observation  _John is home._

The component parts of  _John is home_ begin with smell. Another slighted sense. People become uncomfortable when Sherlock describes their smell, even when they deliberately apply perfumes or other odorants.

Lestrade once tried to explain: "People just don't go around  _smelling_ other people. It's an invasion of personal space and it's a little creepy."

To which Sherlock responded, "How is having  _my_  olfactory sense assaulted from across the room by nauseating cologne an invasion of  _their_ space?" And, perhaps a little more indignantly than necessary, "Since when am I  _people_?" But Sherlock is used to reactions of alarm and disgust, and regards aversion to scent descriptions as yet another mysterious and irksome phenomenon that is unavoidable when dealing with the rest of humanity.

Although Sherlock is intimately familiar with many John smells, he rarely comments on them out loud. He tells himself that this is because John lacks Sherlock's acute sense of smell, so there is no way he could understand Sherlock's descriptions anyway. He's aware of the inconsistency; he often talks over John's head with aplomb and even glee about non smell related subjects. But he files away the irritant of facts that don't add up for later consideration. (Imagined dread, in which John reacts to him with alarm and disgust, of course, has nothing to do with his hesitation.)

Today the flat is heavy with John smell, indicating that he had taken advantage of a day with neither locum work nor cases to not step foot outside. There is new-tea-smell layered over old-soap-smell. Clean-wool-jumper combined with sleep-sweat indicates that he will find John bundled up in his chair, asleep, probably with an old, dog-eared book in his hand.

He remembers being asked once, "Why bother smelling it when you could just  _see_ it?"

He has since deleted the speaker, but he remembers responding "The devil's in the details," not realizing that he was quoting his blind old great-grandmother until after the words had already escaped and could no longer be revoked.

The smell of lavender hand lotion and a creaky sigh of a voice: "Even while you still have eyes, Sherlock, they may fail you. Only a fool forgets his other senses and becomes so dependent on his eyes that he misses other details."

Sherlock is anything but a fool, and even as a child saw the advantage of taking to heart the advice of a woman who could smell exactly where you'd been when you walked in, hear whispered secrets from across the room, and hear the less delicate sounds of Sherlock misbehaving from across the house.

Today there is only the creak of the door in his ears, the crackle and pop of fire in the hearth, and the snuffling breathing of a man deeply asleep.

All of this—sensation, scent, sound—is noted and processed in the second that it takes to open the door. Only then does Sherlock register the data being received by his eyes. His eyebrows shoot up in a rare expression of surprise, and a hint of a smirk tugs up the corner of his mouth.

There is the gratification of correct deductions—as expected, John is asleep in his chair by the fire, a book dangling limply from his hands with its pages brushing the floor. As usual, John has bundled himself in a hideous oatmeal-colored jumper, forsaking his many more aesthetically pleasing options for reasons yet unknown. But there, the usual stops.

Pants. Red ones.

Some unidentifiable fizzy feeling stalls Sherlock's brain for a moment as details present themselves for his observation—leg muscles maintained from running, fine brownish-blonde hairs, kneecaps, shins, thighs and the place where they join the torso, usually hidden skin and  _red pants—_ and it's a long, frustrating moment, mostly because Sherlock has absolutely no desire to describe himself as  _fizzy._  Ever. But, lacking a better term, he files the sensation away for later analysis and allows surprise and amusement to turn his grin wicked.

The moment is gone, and Sherlock's first thought is  _Laundry day_ , immediately followed by  _Gift from his sister, probably as a joke._  John, patron saint of jumpers and other comfortable things, completely indifferent to fashion as it relates to himself, once refused a red button-down in a shop because "colors that bright are just unnecessary." So, red pants, not purchased by John, possibly from a girlfriend who knew very little about him, but more likely an attempt by Harriet Watson to bother and embarrass her brother. Never worn except as a last resort when back-to-back cases have rendered John's clean clothes situation critical.

Perhaps a laundry crisis also explains why the red pants are visible? After all, Sherlock has never known John to go trouserless before.

But then again, things have changed since The Fall. Perhaps half-nakedness isn't unusual when one is used to living alone.

Thoughts of The Fall, thoughts of aloneness, are quickly banished as irrelevant. Sherlock is here, John is here. There's nothing more to think about.

He moves to pick the book up off the floor. Whatever John is reading, however asinine it is, Sherlock can't stand to leave a book to have its pages bent. He remembers John reacting with amusement about Sherlock's treatment of books, saying that it's strange for a man who leaves his experiments sprawling everywhere to fuss over books. Sherlock denied "fussing" over anything, but John had only smiled and gone back to his blogging.

The book is small and worn. There is a note stuck to the cover:

_John—_

_I was going through mum's things and found this. You loved it when we were little, so I thought you might like it back._

_—Harry_

Sherlock frowns. Why would John want a children's book? "Loving" it as a child is one thing, but why would John want it as an adult? He flips to the inside cover, but the title  _Myths and Legends for Children_  does not prove illuminating. In faded pencil, someone has crossed out  _Children_ and written in  _Johnny._  Likely a woman's handwriting, therefore likely John's mother.

Sherlock nearly places the book aside, uninterested in children's tales and already growing bored, but a detail makes him pause. There is a crack in the spine, and when he lets the book fall open in his hands, it's clear that a child has pushed the pages of one story flat more times than any other, leaving broken binding and dingy marks on the edge of the page. John's bookmark makes a red slash across the print. When John was Johnny, a chubby and wide-eyed child far removed from the man that he would become, he returned to this story more than any other. And even now, he has returned to it again, adding an unnecessary marker to a page that he is in no danger of losing.

Tucking the bookmark behind the front cover, Sherlock begins to read.

* * *

_-Long ago, the gods were lonely because they had no one to worship them. So they made human beings.-_

Sherlock expressed his irritation with John by resolving not to inform him that the woman in the church who was currently eyeing him up had an unhealthy obsession with couponing. The results would not be immediate. John wouldn't know that Sherlock was getting back at him for interfering with the investigation, but the knowledge that retribution would be swift soothed Sherlock enough to actually turn away from the communion wine and look at John. Sherlock's look of displeasure quickly morphed into confusion. He had realized that John was irritated with him, but the look on John's face was downright murderous.

Mutual frustration was the default state of being between Sherlock and John. But occasionally, when one's understanding of the other's mind broke down, frustration became fury. Sherlock stood upright, linking his hands behind his back in what probably only John recognized as a gesture of nervousness.

"Not good?" he asked, tone even and low.

"Bit not good," said John through his teeth. Giving a stiff apology to the priest, John grabbed Sherlock by the arm and dragged him away, past the couponer fiddling with a book of hymns so as not to be caught staring, and out of the church.

Before Sherlock could even open his mouth to complain, John rounded on him, the grip on his arm growing tighter.

"I can't even  _begin_ to—What were you—How can you be so—" He stopped. He closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and released Sherlock's arm. When he opened his eyes, ready to try again, Sherlock recognized the resigned expression on his face. This was going to be one of those conversations in which John questioned why a man as smart as Sherlock couldn't understand the most basic of social niceties. As long as they had been friends and partners, these conversations kept happening. Sherlock wanted to ask in return why, for all his ability to read Sherlock when no one else could, John continued to be surprised when Sherlock's mind jumped far ahead of his mouth. Why, every time that Sherlock being himself resulted in someone taking insult, John continued to be disappointed in him.

John obviously was. And Sherlock hated being disappointing.

This time, Sherlock spoke first. It was a risky move. In these situations, sometimes Sherlock tried to predict what had upset John and justify himself, but guessed completely wrong and only made John angrier. It baffled him, the things that John could find to be upset about that never even occurred to Sherlock. But the chase was on and they were wasting time, so today, he'd take the risk. (A decision which, of course, had nothing to do with the shrinking, small feeling associated with being disappointing to John.)

"I refuse to behave as though I subscribe to their belief system when, in fact, my entire philosophy runs contrary to theirs."

"You can't just—" John began. Sherlock suspected a reflex action, John's expectation that he would have to argue his point in order to break through Sherlock's indifference. But, perhaps detecting a genuine attempt to communicate, he stopped, considering. Sherlock desperately ignored the fact that "genuine attempt to communicate" was a phrase he learned from a disapproving Mrs. Hudson the last time that John had stormed out and spent the night away from the flat. Instead, he took John's silence as a cue to continue.

"Even the police suspect that the man was murdered. To continue to claim 'God's will' with the obvious attempt to poison the communion wine is more than ludicrous."

"I know, Sherlock." John sighed and rubbed his forehead. "It's just…Look. I'm not particularly religious myself. But I don't think the priest meant that he didn't suspect murder, that it was some sort of smiting that wouldn't leave any evidence." He studied Sherlock's expression warily, and apparently deciding that he still held Sherlock's attention, continued. "I think what he meant was, even if it was murder, maybe it was God's will that it happened. That everything goes according to God's plan. He was trying to say that you'll figure it out in due time too. It was an encouragement."

Sherlock snorted. "So every murder, every act of violence and human savagery, is part of the plan of a benevolent God? Was he saying that whether or not I solve this case in time to prevent another murder in fact has nothing to do with my intellect, but is God deciding who should die and who should walk free?"

"I never said that I agreed with him."

"Then why—"

"Because that's  _his_ church, Sherlock! People are dying, his parishioners, people he cares about. He was obviously upset, and then you go trying to take away the only thing that's seeing him through this. Just because his belief system doesn't make sense to you doesn't mean that—"

"If a belief system doesn't make sense, then it should be dismantled."

"It doesn't make sense to  _you._ That doesn't mean that everyone has to agree. I don't make sense to you either half the time. Does that mean you should dismantle me?" His lips quirked up in good humor, some of the tension drained away.

"Yes."

John went open-mouthed in his surprise, and Sherlock laughed. Just a tiny pleased sound, there one second and then gone, but it batted away the rest of the tension, and when Sherlock sat down on the church steps, John sat beside him.

"I dismantle you all the time, John. You know that. It's immensely frustrating."

"Is it?" John was still smiling, so Sherlock judged that he was neither disturbed nor offended by the news.

"It is! In some ways you're so simple, and figuring you out is like clockwork. There are patterns and reasons, and logical actions that you take."

"But then I do things that surprise you."

"Yes! Things that don't quite fit the patterns, so I have to rewrite them again. I am constantly rewriting you, John. I hope that you realize how much trouble you are."

John laughed, and it was Sherlock's turn to tuck a smile into the corner of his mouth, trying and failing shoo it away.

They took a moment of quiet, examining the sky.

Then John said, almost as though the thought slipped out of him and was never meant for discussion, "Maybe that's the problem with religion."

"What is?"

"You can't rewrite the patterns. They're just stuck in place, no matter what you see and what happens to you. No matter how you change. Maybe sometimes, you outgrow them."

John didn't talk about Afghanistan, but Sherlock knew when his thoughts returned there. So many times, he laid bare other's thoughts regardless of their feelings. He did it to John. But never about this. He let a beat of silence pass, before glancing askance at John and responding, "It's man who created gods to serve his needs, not the other way around."

John's eyes remained on the sky. "I suppose it's because if there are no gods, then you're just…alone."

The thought just blurted right out of him: "I don't need gods. I have you."

John's face went blank for a heart-stopping moment as he stared at Sherlock. Certain that the smile that followed had chased away all thoughts of Afghanistan, Sherlock leapt to his feet. (He was not avoiding acknowledging what he had just said out of embarrassment. He  _was not._  He was Sherlock Holmes and he didn't get embarrassed.)

"The coupons!" he cried as his synapses finally made the right connection and lit up. John had that effect on him; how he did it was one of the many patterns that Sherlock struggled to identify and constantly rewrote with new data.

"The...coupons?"

As Sherlock dashed back into the church to confront the couponer and John followed cluelessly after, he resolved that just this once he would protect John from the advances of the obviously unstable woman.

Just this once.

* * *

- _Humans had two heads, and four arms and four legs, but only one heart. They were perfect and whole.-_

"This is ridiculous! Get  _off—"_

"You're ridiculous!"

"What are you, thirteen?"

John squirmed against the confines of Sherlock's jacket, buttoned up and pinning his arms to his sides. He glared up at Sherlock, who sat on John's knees. Smirking at his victory and with no flailing limbs available to strike out at his face, Sherlock leaned forward to explain John's error calmly and carefully.

"John. I am looking out for your best interests."

" _You_  don't get to decide what my best interests are!"

Sherlock frowned. John had not denied Sherlock's own statement of his intentions, which threw off several prepared lines of argument. He expected John to say that whatever Sherlock was doing, he was looking out for his own interests. That he never had just one motive. That he wanted something from John, otherwise he wouldn't interfere. That an inherently selfish being could never really have someone else's best interests as his primary motivation.

He would save this unexpected crisis of mind until he no longer sat astride an angry John. Without a doubt, John could unseat him if he really wanted to. The thought that John was letting Sherlock pin him was not encouraging.

Betraying none of this, Sherlock said, "Explain."

John sighed, giving a perfunctory but half-hearted wriggle, and then resigned himself to having this conversation while trapped inside a coat. "It doesn't matter that you think you know best about everything."

"I  _do_  know—"

"Shut up. It doesn't matter that you've predicted an end to this already. I haven't, and it's my choice that matters here. And hers. And I get that maybe you've seen whatever details you've seen and put them together and decided that since you already know the outcome, why go through the motions of getting there? Why not just avert the whole mess before it happens?"

"That's exactly—"

"But here's what you  _don't_  understand." John waited a beat, as if to see whether Sherlock would choose indignation or curiosity. Sherlock tilted his head slightly to the side. John continued, "I'm an adult, Sherlock. I have to make my own decisions. I can't live my life letting other people make my choices for me, even you. It doesn't mean I never take other's advice into account, especially yours, since you're better informed than most."

Sherlock smiled, and it was almost shy. He refrained from interrupting.

"This isn't about you. It's about giving people a chance. It's about…not giving in to fatalism. Don't think I don't see where the signs are pointing. But, just once in a blue moon, people change."

Hesitantly, Sherlock said, "She wasn't lying. She really has been sober for three months."

"But she's been sober that long before and it hasn't lasted, I know."

"And when it doesn't last you blame yourself. Every time."

"I know."

"It's not your fault John."

"I know."

Neither of them spoke.

John said, "People can't be perfect."

Sherlock snorted. "I know."

He didn't say,  _but you're close enough to be getting on with._  He accepted the inevitable and rolled with it when John threw him off, and helped unbutton the coat.

When Harry arrived at the door John answered in his usual attire, and Sherlock lurked in his chair, neither giving any sign that they had fought. Harry seemed to know, somehow. Perhaps she shared some of the same Watson senses that made John such an excellent Sherlock interpreter. Or perhaps, she simply knew her brother. She glanced at Sherlock before returning her gaze to John. She smiled, wry but genuine.

"Hey little bro. You ready?"

"Lead the way."

She looked back to Sherlock. "I'll bring him home safe."

At a glare from John, Sherlock acknowledged her with a nod.

Harry's grin grew wider, happier. "Wouldn't want to deprive you of your better half."

John made a strangled noise that was half embarrassed and half amused. But Sherlock, for the moment, had eyes only for Harry. She stood straighter under his scrutiny.

What he saw was…reassuring, for once.

Not perfection. He saw the tired eyes and almost invisible tension in the body of a struggling addict, with which Sherlock could sympathize in ways that John never could. But the eyes looked like John's, and something about the mouth and chin. The sandy hair. Even the promise of muscle in the arms.

John belonged to Harry more than he belonged to Sherlock, from Watson hair on Watson heads to Watson arms swinging unconsciously in the uncomfortably long pause.

But all the same.

"I trust that you'll keep him out of trouble for the night."

And for once, Harry understood where John did not. Trust was a hard earned gift that only John seemed to give so easily. She gave Sherlock a half salute as she linked her arm with her brother's.

"John's the trouble maker of the two of us! But I'll do my best."

John, unaware that something like a truce had passed between the two most important people in his life, said, "You don't need to worry about me," before letting Harry tug him out the door.

For once, Sherlock had to concede to John's good judgment in refusing to give up on the people important to him. He'd make sure to never again use "good judgment" and "John" in the same thought, however. It was rather unsettling.

* * *

_-But human beings were so perfect that they didn't need the gods. The gods became angry and jealous, so they tore each human in two and flung the halves far apart from each other.-_

First they came together, and then they fell apart.

No one seemed to expect them to make it, despite the evidence that each was so much better as one half of a partnership.

John was better. Everyone could see it. Sherlock was better. Only certain people could see it, the chosen few, but they saw that he was  _so much_ better.

Then, at the time when they were as close to perfection as two damaged human beings could become, he fell.

First there was pride, and then there was The Fall.

And when he came back, oceans of silence lay between two people who so desperately wanted to fit together again.

But all the king's horses and all the king's men…

* * *

_-Broken, in pain, and alone, the humans began to worship the gods, hoping for help.-_

Sherlock had no gods. All he had was himself.

(He had John. But not really, anymore.)

He had two eyes which continued to function perfectly fine, thank you very much.

(But you can't count on your eyes to always be there for you.)

He had two ears which were alert for every change in tone, every indication of a crack in the wall.

(But John had been a soldier. He had built quite the thick wall.)

He had a nose to pick up the subtler things.

(Before The Fall, the smell of nightmares, fear-sweat clinging to John when he woke in the morning, had all but disappeared. It was back now.)

He had the mighty and all-encompassing organ of his skin.

(He detected only pressure and dared not touch.)

Only his tongue was completely useless.

("I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry…")

Sherlock had the work. Sherlock even had his blogger.

But he didn't  _really_ have John.

It would have to be enough. He would have to make it enough. Because the alternative to half-John was no-John, and that was unacceptable.

Never again.

* * *

_-The gods were pleased—all except one. The humans that she helped create were so sad now. So she decided to answer their prayers, and help.-_

"You have to give it time, love. You boys are both healing."

Mrs. Hudson's kitchen was a sanctum of light. It had nothing to do with the décor, which Sherlock described as garish at best, or the biscuits which were quite good but not the best, or the chairs which were unable to properly contain Sherlock's height.

It was the woman herself. Before The Fall, Sherlock had never admitted so out loud. After, only once. When he first saw Mrs. Hudson again, after she overcame the initial waves of shock and anger and fell into relief, Sherlock wrapped her tightly in his arms. Whole minutes, he stood listening to her heart and feeling her living heat warm him through his coat. He whispered, his voice low and scratchy, "I missed you." She burst into tears and held him tighter.

He sat in her kitchen, absently munching on biscuits, and let her presence calm him. She wasn't a cure-all, but his agitation was interfering with his ability to think properly, which wouldn't do at all. When he didn't answer, she sighed, and sat at the table across from him.

"What happened?"

Sherlock considered, chewing slowly to give himself more time. It took a lot of effort to admit, and only Mrs. Hudson could draw it out of him.

"I'm not exactly sure."

Mrs. Hudson hummed, and said, "This calls for tea."

She bustled about outside of Sherlock's field of vision, giving him time to collect his thoughts.

"We were arguing. About the work."

"He still doesn't want to come back?"

Sherlock winced, glad that Mrs. Hudson couldn't see.

"He insists that I'm fine on my own. I've got my work, he's got his. Most flatmates don't work together."

He didn't say how much it hurt that John continued to insist upon their demotion to flatmates. Not partners. Not friends. Flatmates. To hurt was to be human, and unfortunately he was a member of the species, but that didn't mean he ever had to admit it.

Mrs. Hudson wasn't fooled. She set Sherlock's tea in front of him and waited until his mouth was full before saying, "He still loves you, Sherlock."

Sherlock choked and began to cough. Mrs. Hudson sat back down and gave him a fondly exasperated look. "I know, I know. You don't have emotions and all that. He does have emotions, but doesn't say them so plainly. The sort of man he is, I'm not surprised."

"Mrs. Hudson—"

She ignored him. "I have never met two people quite like you boys. Perhaps you're right, Sherlock, that you don't feel things quite the same  _way_ as other people. But even in its special Sherlock form, and even if you don't recognize it for what it is, I know love when I see it."

Sherlock drained his cup to avoid speaking. "He's not—"

"I know."

And more quietly, " _I'm_  not—"

"He's not asking you to be anything different. You just have to be patient. He needs time to forgive you."

"Can't I—"

She sighed, and patted his hand. "I'm afraid there's no speeding these things along, love. You've apologized, haven't you?"

He nodded. Her eyes narrowed slightly.

"Properly?"

He nodded again. She studied him for a moment before smiling and taking his hands in hers.

"I believe you. He knows what you did for him, and you've done all that you can to make up for what wrong you did him. The rest just needs time."

Sherlock frowned, petulant. "And there's nothing that can speed it along?"

The implicit  _nothing that I can do to fix what I broke_  went unspoken, but Mrs. Hudson squeezed his hands.

"Just be there when he's ready to forgive you properly and accept whatever he gives with good grace."

Sherlock thought that he had never displayed good grace in his life, but for John, he would try.

* * *

_-She could not simply put the halves back together again, because once they had been torn apart they started to grow into separate people. Instead, she spun a red thread from their prayers.-_

Sherlock's mind remained undimmed by the distraction of emotions, and so one of his biggest fears was soothed without the requirement of admitting it out loud. But despite Mrs. Hudson's admonishment that John needed time and Sherlock could not deduce the right words to say to speed along forgiveness, he had to try.

"John."

John grunted, not looking up from his newspaper.

"John!"

"What is it, Sherlock?" John said, grumbling and still not raising his eyes.

A cold and unpleasant sensation settled in the pit of Sherlock's stomach. If he had to give it a name, he would call it despair. Sometimes, John was almost normal with him. (How the mighty had fallen, that Sherlock Holmes would crave something  _normal_.) Always, a layer of caution lay between them, but when it was at its thinnest and most fragile Sherlock saw the real John look back at him untainted by grief. This John hid behind his wall, would not look at Sherlock and instead pretended to read his newspaper, but his eyes didn't move.

Sherlock fully intended to say nothing. He intended to walk away, out into the London rain which still made sense, which held secrets in the twists and turns of familiar streets but would yield them if only Sherlock paid attention. He intended to leave John to the supposed healing powers of time.

What evidence did he have in favor of time? To let time go by and do nothing was a waste. Instead, he blurted, "What is the process by which a person earns forgiveness?"

John did look up at him then, eyes wide and startled for a moment before he quickly smoothed out his expression. Sherlock knew that he performed similar feats of facial tempering all the time, but on John, who was meant to be such an open book, they screamed of wrongness.

Tearing his eyes away, Sherlock began to pace. "Forgive: to give up resentment of or claim to requital for; to grant relief from payment of. These are all processes that take place within the mind of the wronged party. To give up a claim to requital when requital is deserved indicates a decision on the part of the wronged party to absolve a debt. But who absolves a debt for nothing, expecting nothing in return? Maybe one would displace it in favor of a different kind of repayment, but not for nothing. Why give up resentment when one expects to receive nothing in return?"

Sherlock suddenly rounded on John, and was both relieved and uneasy to see that while there was no anger on his face or in the way he held his shoulders or his sitting posture, there was no emotional response at all. (It's not that he suddenly valued emotion so highly. It's just that John wasn't  _John_  without it.)

Frustrated, Sherlock shouted, "What do you  _want_  from me?"

In the ringing silence, Sherlock recognized his own signs. Even John would be able to see the way Sherlock's shoulders slumped and his head lowered as all of the fight went out of him. There was no hiding his own distress and Sherlock  _hated_  being so obvious.

He hated being helpless. He hated not knowing.

Lowly, like a prayer, he said, "Just tell me what I'm supposed to do."

A rustle told Sherlock that John slowly set his paper down and rose from his chair, but he didn't look up. He let John walk up close before raising his head and trying to collect what data he could from the contradictions of eyes grown softer paired with lips pressed together in a hard line.

Whatever data John collected in turn from Sherlock made him bring his hand up to smooth the curls back from Sherlock's forehead. Sherlock watched him, wide-eyed, and held very still. Willingness to touch had to indicate good things. Without any direct experience in the area, Sherlock could not form a solid conclusion about what those things were, but the fingers that traced his hairline and his cheek felt pleasant and cool and left Sherlock's facial nerves ticklish and tingling, so he could definitely hypothesize that they were good things.

"I don't know either, Sherlock."

Not expecting words, Sherlock's breath hitched.

"I wish I knew. I wish I could just…forgive you. Just like that."

Calculating the risk, Sherlock lightly placed his hand on the side of John's neck, just to feel the warmth there, the pulse point beneath the skin. He was rewarded when John didn't flinch away.

"But I don't know how."

Sherlock nodded his understanding, even though, for once, he didn't understand at all.

John sighed. "You'll just have to wait for me, okay?"

The  _like I waited for you_  went unspoken.

Sherlock let his forehead fall against John's. He didn't know why a conversation in which nothing constructive was actually said would make him feel more hopeful, but lately there were a lot of things about John that he didn't know.

"Alright."

* * *

_-She tied the red thread around one ankle of each half, binding the two halves together. No matter how far apart the two halves were in space and time, the thread would stretch and never break, so they would always be able to find one another again.-_

A shift occurred that Sherlock could only attribute to the mysterious force of  _time._ There was no logical explanation. Sherlock didn't change anything about his behavior, and for the most part, neither did John. They worked separately, they lived together. But suddenly there they were, taking meals together again when Sherlock remembered to eat. There they were on the sofa, Sherlock yelling at bad TV and John laughing beside him. There they were, bickering with the amused edge of friends instead of the hardness of true bitterness which accompanied disagreements immediately after The Fall.

Sherlock shared his bafflement and a slew of detailed John observation notebooks with Mrs. Hudson, who only smiled, patted him on the head, and offered him another biscuit.

And then, ridiculously late one night or early one morning as Sherlock paced a loop around the sofa, sorting the threads of a case in his mind, John came downstairs and fixed himself a cup of tea, probably awakened by a nightmare. He sat in his chair in silence for a few minutes, watching Sherlock, before he sighed with just a hint of a grin and said, "Well, go on then." And Sherlock was off, filling John in on the case as though they had never stopped doing this.

At the end of it all, they sat on the floor of a convenience store bathroom as the sun began to rise, bruised and out of breath and soaking wet as Lestrade lectured them and the police led a man away in handcuffs. And as their eyes met, something clicked back into place, some frayed and torn thing was sewn back together, and they started to laugh.

Sherlock never credited time as the healer. It was partnering again that really healed wounds.

* * *

 _-_ And then, written in pencil in a woman's handwriting:  _So you know when you've met the other half of you, because all of their broken, jagged places match up with yours.—_

Sherlock carefully puts the bookmark back in place, closes the book, and sets it gently in John's lap. He stands and watches John for a minute, trying to memorize every detail.

He's sure by now that John isn't going anywhere. But just in case.

He reaches out to card his fingers through John's hair so he will know what touch sensation to cross-reference with sandy blondeness in his visual database. It's a little coarser than he expected, and he finds that he likes it.

John wakes at the touch, blinking confusedly up at the unexpected apparition. Sherlock quickly removes his hand.

"You're back early," he croaks, voice heavy with sleep.

"Actually, I'm back very late. You fell asleep."

"Oh," John says. He stretches very thoroughly, arms up above his head and toes flexing and curling. The annoying fizzy feeling returns and Sherlock resolutely ignores it. When John suddenly becomes aware of his state of undress, his gaze darts up to meet Sherlock's. "Uhhh," he says stupidly.

Sherlock smirks. "Laundry day?"

John rolls his eyes. "Laundry day."

"They're  _red_ —"

Rather than allow him to continue, John throws the first available object at Sherlock's head, which happens to be the book.

"Don't throw books!" says Sherlock indignantly, fumbling to catch it. John laughs at him.

When Sherlock turns the book over in his hands, opens the cover, and reads aloud, " _Myths and Legends for Johnny,_ " John seems to realize the ammunition that he has given him. He blushes lightly.

"It's just something that my mum used to read me, and Harry found it in her things…" John mumbles, not meeting Sherlock's eyes. Sherlock notes that while John displays no embarrassment at being caught half naked in red pants, being caught with an old children's book causes extreme discomfort. Then he wonders if it's not the book itself, but the reaction that he fears from Sherlock.

What would Sherlock have said, if he hadn't just read a story so infused with memories of John? Probably John would be right to be wary of criticism.

He has two options. He could try to behave as John expects, hiding his confusion and unwanted emotions, or he could be truthful. Sherlock does not have a good track record with truth, as evidenced by The Fall. In light of this, perhaps a new strategy is called for.

So, he says, "I read the page that you have bookmarked. About the red thread."

John cautiously meets Sherlock's eyes. "Yeah?" He furrows his brows. "Why? I mean, I would've thought…"

Sherlock knows what John would've thought, so he ignores it. Opting for the truth is harder than he thought it would be. The words, the  _sentiment_ of them, stick in his throat. "I wanted to understand what was so important about that story. Why you returned to it often enough as a child to break the book's binding, and why you would return to it again as an adult, after so many years."

John considers him for a moment, as though looking for evidence of a trap. Sherlock shifts uncomfortably under his scrutiny.

"It was my mum's favorite story. She was something of a…romantic, I guess. When I was little, I'd get out this book and read it to her all the time because I knew that it made her happy when things were…tough."

Sherlock didn't ask what the tough things were. It was like Afghanistan. Like The Fall. It didn't matter now.

"And now…" he begins, but after he glances at Sherlock he breaks off, unsure of himself.

"You are something of a romantic, too," Sherlock says. John quirks a half grin at him, and there's a sudden rush of activity in Sherlock's synapses as connection after connection forms, lighting up the whole array.

He has a sudden suspicion of what the fizzy feeling is.

"It's ridiculous, of course," Sherlock blusters, beginning to pace. "Even ignoring the existence of gods and the obvious metaphor of two heads and eight limbs meant to represent unity rather than anatomic perfection, it assumes that every human being is part of a matched pair when there is no evidence to suggest such a thing likely or possible."

"Right," says John, sounding amused. Sherlock stops to look at him, and sees a soft smile that starts with the turn-ups at the corners of John's lips and ends with the wrinkles around his eyes. "It's only a story."

"Right," Sherlock echoes stupidly.

"But do you know what I think?"

"Usually."

"Shut up. What I think is…" John stops, watching Sherlock's face as though deciding something very important. When he stands and walks right up close, Sherlock studiously avoids looking down at the red pants.

He begins again. "What I think is that if there are no gods, if there's no one to listen to prayers and spin a mystical red thread to bind people together across lifetimes…then there's just people."

"Just people?" Sherlock echoes. It's quite unacceptable that he can't think of anything more relevant to say, but John is standing very close and Sherlock is too busy cataloguing every shift in air and temperature and pressure as John slides a hand through Sherlock's curls.

"Mmm," John agrees. "Nobody's out there setting us up. So it's just us. Making our own choices. Spinning our own threads."

The light-web of Sherlock's mind jumps ahead to the logical conclusion of this scenario. But this is John. It won't hurt to take the time to be absolutely certain.

Sherlock says, "We've done quite a lot to tie ourselves together. More than most."

"Definitely," John agrees again, "but I can think of one more thing."

Sherlock hesitates only a moment before asking, "Does it have anything to do with feeling…fizzy?"

John gives a startled laugh, and then kisses him. Sherlock takes that as a yes.


End file.
